Frederick and his tax collectors did everything in their power to raise money in Prussia, but Prussia's strength paled in comparison with that of England. Pen | fun | pavilion www. ｂｉｑｕｇｅ。 ｉｎｆｏ

At the time of the Great War, Britain had a fleet of more than 120 capital ships, a military roster of more than 200,000 men, including German mercenaries, and financial support for Prussia.

In fact, the Seven Years' War cost about £160 million, of which £60 million (37%) was raised in the financial markets.

Although the further growth of the national debt caused unease among Pitt's colleagues and led to his ouster in October 1761, the country's overseas trade grew, resulting in an increase in tariff revenues and a national prosperity.

This is an excellent example of how profits are converted into strength, and that Britain's naval power is being used (for example, in the West Indies) to safeguard the growth of national profits.

As the British ambassador to Prussia had been told, we had to be merchants before we could be soldiers, and trade and naval power depended on each other.

Moreover, the real resource wealth of the country depends on its trade.

On the contrary, the economies of all the other belligerents suffered heavily in the war, and even within France, French Prime Minister Choiseul sadly admitted: "In Europe in the present situation, it is colonial trade and naval power that determine the balance of power on the continent." ”

Like all other countries that could not fight without the allowances of the great trading powers, the Austrian crown, the Russian crown, and the Prussian king were merely second-rate monarchs.

The same is true for Huaguo, without a strong navy, the Huahuang is not even as good as a second-rate monarch, because Huaguo's influence cannot go out of the surrounding areas of Huaguo at all, at most it has a little influence in South Asia and East Asia.

The military art of the army and navy displayed by the Anglo-Prussian alliance manifested itself in several ways after the initial setbacks: at sea, the large Royal Navy under Anson gradually established a blockade of the ports of the French Atlantic, and still had the strength to build a barrier outside the port of Toulon and regain its preponderance in the Mediterranean.

When the fleet was engaged in a real confrontation near Lagos and Cartagena, Hawke led a fleet of unparalleled forces in the world to pursue Conflon's fleet in a raging storm and force it into the harbor of Quiberon.

In these battles, the British Navy repeatedly demonstrated great seamanship skills.

Not only that, but the British naval detachment, which had a full-fledged logistical supply system, carried out an all-weather blockade of France.

The British blockade policy not only stifled much of France's maritime trade, thus protecting British commerce and its territory, but also prevented France from sending sufficient reinforcements to the West Indies, Canada, and India.

1759 was a year full of miracles, as French colonies around the world fell to the British, which greatly encouraged the Anglo-German forces to defeat the two French armies at Minden.

When Spain foolishly entered the war in 1762, the same fate befell its colonies in the Caribbean and the Philippines.

At the same time, the Brandenburg royal family has seen a "miracle" of its own.

In the two battles of Rossbach and Lessen, Frederick not only destroyed a French army and an Austrian army, but also thwarted the attempts of the two countries to approach North Germany.

After Frederick defeated the Austrians again in Lignitz and Torgau in 1760, Vienna was almost at the end of its rope.

However, the cost of these campaigns alone was slowly crushing the Prussian army (60,000 soldiers lost in 1759 alone), while Russia, a formidable enemy, proved to be much stronger, partly because of Elizabeth's bitter hatred of Frederick, but mainly because every encounter with the Russian army was littered with corpses and rivers of blood.

The other belligerents felt that France was anxious to reach a compromise with England, which was now also preparing to make peace, but Prussia found that it had enough strength to hold back the Austrians and Russians until Elizabeth's death saved them in 1762.

After Elizabeth's death, the new Tsar Peter quickly withdrew from the war, so that neither Austria nor France could expect any better outcome than to reconcile on the basis of a return to the pre-war European posture.

The return to the pre-war posture in Europe actually meant the defeat of those countries that were going to destroy Prussia.

It was clearly Britain that profited from the 1762-1763 settlement.

Even after returning the territories they had seized to France and Spain, Britain made great strides in the West Indies and West Africa.

It essentially eliminated French influence in India, and most importantly Britain became the dominant power over much of the North American continent.

In this way, Britain possessed a much larger and richer land than Lorraine, Silesia, and other countries of the continent fiercely contested.

In addition, Britain stifled French diplomatic and military ambitions on a European scale, thus ensuring a general balance of power.

In contrast, France not only suffered heavy losses overseas, but, unlike in 1748, it also failed on European soil.

In fact, the lifeless performance of the French Army in the war heralded the shift of Europe's center of gravity from Western Europe to Eastern Europe.

The British spent 400 years expanding and annexing into a 34 million square kilometer empire, and then spent 100 years constantly splitting and reorganizing and stripping back to the starting point 500 years ago.

The decline was preceded by a resurgence of independence movements in the colonies after the end of World War I.

Britain itself was more concerned with the economic benefits obtained on the basis of the Imperial System of Preferences than with the possession of the colonies.

It's just that they didn't do it, and Hua Huang saw this very clearly.

This is also the reason why relations between Britain and France suddenly changed for the better in the 19th century.

Francis, Louis XIV, Napoleon and England have fought many times, not to mention the deep hatred of the Hundred Years' War, Britain has also engaged in several anti-French alliances, but after Napoleon was defeated, France never fought with Britain again, and joined the Holy Alliance, and then worked with Britain to fight the Manchu Qing, Ganlucia, and Gandeutsch became good friends.

It was once difficult for the Emperor to understand two neighboring world superpowers, how to say it well.

Colonization in both the Manchus and elsewhere was a petty one.

The Crimean War was also only a manifestation of the continental balance of power policy.

What really changed the UK's national policy was the sincere agreement.

From the perspective of posterity, it was a compromise of British diplomacy, a victory of French diplomacy and a defeat of German diplomacy.

Bringing the whole of Europe to war, to destruction.

Britain pursued a policy of "continental balance of power, glorious isolation".

On the European continent, no one can be better than the other.

He will always oppose the boss of the European continent, and unite two, three, four, five, six against the boss.

At that time, the most powerful country on the European continent was France, so the anti-French alliance was formed seven times to defeat Napoleon.

After Napoleon's defeat, the Russian Cossack cavalry was the first to storm Paris, so Russia called itself the "gendarme of Europe" and did whatever it wanted.

Britain was troubled, so they had to unite their former enemies and crusade against their former allies.

The national policy of Britain since Elizabeth I, as a maritime country, the highest pursuit of international politics is "glorious independence", independence from Europe, who dominates in Europe is like a whack-a-mole to a hammer, to be an offshore balancer.

After defeating Napoleon, Tsarist Russia became the gendarme of Europe at that time, so of course Britain had to turn the spearhead and make friends with France.

The same history can be compared to Britain's appeasement of Germany after World War I, also based on an offshore balance.

In the words of the Germans, Britain would not ally with anyone sincerely, but only to find someone in Europe to block his bullets.

Britain wants to maintain the continental balance of power.

As the saying goes, there are no eternal friends and no eternal enemies, only eternal interests.

The British have this kind of foreign policy in Europe, which extends to the whole world, and the same is true of their concept, and they call for a balance of power policy on the surface, but in fact because they are already the hegemon and have already obtained the largest amount of land, it is impossible for Britain to allow the development of China, the only great power in Asia.

Before the 19th century, whether it was the Sun King or Napoleon, France was the hegemon of the European continent, and it was not necessarily just enough to save a piece of Austria.

By the mid-to-late 19th century, France was instigated, and Prussia began to be bullish.

So the British felt it was time to change their allies.

In this way, the established impression formed by the Chinese emperor for a long time seemed that the relationship between England and France had always been very good.

From the diplomatic side, it provides two perspectives: First, peace under British rule is, to put it bluntly, that Britain's world hegemony was truly established during this period. So much so that no country wanted to go to war with such a powerful Britain, including France. Second, the glorious isolation of Britain does not directly use its own strength, but uses it as a weight to press on the balance of the European continent's diplomacy, allowing other countries to contribute, and pressing the position behind itself, in an effort to ensure the balance of power. In response to such an approach by Britain, it would be wise to welcome Britain's support and seek closer relations with Britain, not confrontation, and this includes, of course, France.

Outside of Europe, although the speed of China's rise is not enough to panic the British, it is an indisputable fact that China has the strength to become a world hegemon, so suppressing China is a national policy that will not change.

When the emperor thoroughly understood this, the idea gradually became clearer, but the pressure was getting bigger and bigger, and there was still a little fantasy before, the weak, always unrealistically hoping that the strong could be friendly to themselves, even if it was pretending, obviously, the British didn't even plan to pretend.

Britain and France supported Japan in order to curb the development of Tsarist Russia in the Far East, and now, in the same way, by supporting Japan, they can curb the development of China in Asia.

Therefore, every strategy must look at the problem from the perspective of the whole world.